#mirkwood has negative connotations

[sotwk]

You can tell how a writer feels about Thranduil based on how often they try to use "Greenwood" or "Woodland Realm", when referring to his kingdom, instead of the more commonly known name, "Mirkwood".

[0aurelion-sol0]

So there's something that caught my eyes in those two recaps so far that I think is really interesting...

The numbers.

For El, it is 74, of course 7+4 equal 11. She is the number after all.

But 7 is again a very odd number as it appears a lot throughout ST yet we don't know what it means or if it even means anything. You have various posts about it like one that @beepboop358 made on their blog that you can find in their pinned index post.

After that, 4 for season 4, simple.

But Mike only has 7 since 7 +/-/×/÷ 0 doesn't do anything. And 7 is an interesting number as I said above.

Both 7 and 11 have important religious meanings. And Mike and El have strong inspirations in religions, religious figures and even names. Such as the Archangel Michael, repeatedly depicted as the “great captain,” the leader of the heavenly hosts, and the warrior helping the children of Israel. And Ēl is a Northwest Semitic word meaning "god" or "deity", or referring (as a proper name) to any one of multiple major ancient Near Eastern deities.

(We can also add a possible 7/11 reference here.) There are other meanings to these numbers in religion but it's not what we're interested in right now.

Now this is all very nice but...

...my brain worked, yes it did, for once, brain said it had found something that I do think is interesting. 😏

Notice how the recap for Mike was posted 4 days after El's... What's in 4 days after Mike's recap ?

March 22nd. And on that day, it is the birthday of Will. Perhaps we will get something on that day (recap, teaser, trailer...) but if we do get something, there's something important to point out about that day.

March 22nd, Will's birthday, this year, will the 66th day before Season 4 releases.

How is that important ? Well if we do the same thing we did for 74 which equals 11 and equals 70 which is just 7...

...6+6=12. 😏

And you know where I'm going with this since I already talked about it here:

But 66 is an interesting number for religious connections and symbolisms. With two other numbers.

The number 6 usually has a negative connotation in the Bible. For instance, Christ suffered on the cross for six hours and men were commanded to work six days a week in Exodus. In the Greek alphabet the number 6 is represented by a symbol called the "stigma." In the Bible, the number 6 symbolizes man and human weakness, the evils of Satan and the manifestation of sin.

In modern popular culture, 666 has become one of the most widely recognized symbols for the Antichrist or, alternatively, the devil. The number 666 is purportedly used to invoke Satan. Earnest references to the number occur both among apocalypticist Christian groups and in explicitly anti-Christian subcultures.

So what about 66 ? Well in ST, religious elements have already been here for a long time but they really started to show up in season 3 and seems to become quite important in season 4. The Hellfire Club, Devil's Baby (firework which was given to Will by Lucas.) and Hawkins literally being named Hell. Billy died in a Christ-like manner at the end of season 3. And we had three teasers on the 6th day of a month, which in the end made 666. It is also likely that the Satanic Panic will play a big role in Season 4.

The number 66, however, is a number that does not have any particular meaning in religion compared to the other two. It's mentioned only two times in the bible. There's still some interesting connections that could be made.

The total number of chapters in the Bible Book of Isaiah.

The number of verses in Chapter 3 of the Book of Lamentations in the Old Testament.

The total number of books in the Protestant edition of the Bible (Old Testament and New Testament) combined. And the 66th chapter being The Book Of Revelation. 🤔

Now even more interesting, Six numbers in the Bible are multiple of 66, and the sum of their occurrence gives 11. And, 6 x 11 = 66. Also the sum of the occurrences of all numbers of the Bible multiples of 11 and written in their cardinal form gives 66.

The word "curse" is used 66 times in the Old Testament. (Which reminds me of Vecna's curse.)

Other more interesting things is, if we take into account the SBP gang on the run plotline, they might need to take a certain famous road if they go back to Hawkins.

The designation of the historic U.S. Route 66, dubbed the "Mother Road" by novelist John Steinbeck.

By using the correspondence A=1, B=2, ..., Z=26, we discover that the name of "the man" in French ("l'homme") gives 66 as numerical value, just as that dead ("mort") (Zombie Boy) and to curse ("maudir") (Vecna's Curse) give each one 66. By using the opposite correspondence (A=26, Z=1), we find that the word cross (in French "croix") gives also 66.

Given the fact that Will is a Star Wars fan, in the Star Wars movie series, Order 66 is a prepared order to the clone troopers to kill the Jedi commanding them. Which are both on the ST4 video store movie list.

So as you see, there could be multiple different connections and meanings just like number 11 and number 7. But a few things comes back with this, 6+6 = 12. Which you can see above, I think is connected to a certain thing about Will.

But 66÷3 makes 22 which brings us back to March 22nd which is 3/22. And it makes even more sense to do that since a recap of season 3 on Will's birthday on the 66th day of the countdown until the release makes sense.

So we have two numbers coming back 3 and 12. If you put them together in a way that connects to ST, it makes 3:00 am, "The Witching Hour" which we've seen on clocks of two previous teasers before that. In the Rainbow Room and Creel House, which we've seen on their clocks. (Clock who only have 12 numbers, may I add.)

In folklore, the witching hour or devil's hour is a time of night that is associated with supernatural events, whereby witches, demons and ghosts are thought to appear and be at their most powerful. Definitions vary, and include the hour immediately after midnight, and the time between 3:00 am and 4:00 am.

In the Western Christian tradition, the hour between 3 and 4 a.m. was considered a period of peak supernatural activity – this time is also referred to as the "Devil's hour" due to it being a mocking inversion of the time in which Jesus supposedly died, which was at 3 pm. Plus much like Jesus, Will "died" in episode 3 of season 1, "came back from the dead" after that. (Episode 3 going into 4 is also where the most important twists or stuff happens. It also fits with the witchcraft element of the Witching Hour since Will is a cleric and dressed as a wizard before.) He resurrected in a certain way, much like other characters like El and Hopper. These three are also the only ones to have gotten BTS videos compared to all the other characters.

So again we're going back to the religious elements and how that connects to ST's symbolisms and connections with religions. Which seems to be an important of season 4 already as we have covered above.

Anyway, here is some interesting food, just in case.